DJ Muggs

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DJ Muggs (born January 28, 1968 in Queens), also known as Muggs, is Cypress Hill's DJ and producer. His real name is Lawrence Muggerud. He is Italian-American and Norwegian-American, with his surname Muggerud being of Norwegian origin.

He was first a member of 7A3, but their record label soon dropped them. Cypress Hill, whose sound was crafted by Muggs, became one of the most popular and influential hip hop groups of the 20th century. Muggs also performed as a solo artist, and he worked together with Tricky. He produced albums for House of Pain and Funkdoobiest, and produced tracks for artists such as Ice Cube, KRS-One, Eminem and MC Eiht. Also part of the infamous group, the Soul Assassins, Muggs has his own Sirius satellite radio show on Shade 45 called “Mash-Up Radio.” His solo album as "Muggs", Dust (album), has a trip-hop sound and features a remix of Greg Dulli's "Fat City". Another recent work is a collaboration called The Grandmasters with legendary hip-hop artist GZA (The Genius).

The Grandmasters LP was one of the first two albums released by Angeles Records, a record label formed in 2005 by DJ Muggs and hip-hop duo Self Scientific.

[edit] Technique

Muggs' beats have been known for their dusty-sounding, eerie and soul-driven melodies. Most of Cypress Hill's production was minimalistic with hard-hitting drums and bass, looped throughout the song; the recent GZA album Grandmasters featured that production. In the later 90's/early 2000's, Cypress Hill began incorporating rock more into their beats, coming away with a rap/rock sound akin to that of Rick Rubin. This gleaned spotty reactions from many fans, though just about as many praise the change. More recently Muggs has delved into rock mash-ups, such as combining Big Pun's "Still Not a Player" with a backing that heavily samples Incubus's "Drive".